L.A. Drama Critics Circle Award nominations announced

Jonah Platt, left, and Mark Whitten star in the La Mirada Theatre for the Performing Arts' production of "Floyd Collins," which was nominated for the 2014 Los Angeles Drama Critics Circle Award for best production. (Michael Lamont)

The Los Angeles Drama Critics Circle on Thursday announced its nominations for excellence in theater for Los Angeles and Orange counties in 2014.

Among the names singled out for recognition in a ceremony to be hosted by Dixie Longate of "Dixie's Tupperware Party" fame on March 16: Annette Bening for her solo performance in "Ruth Draper's Monologues" at the Geffen Playhouse, Barry Manilow for his work on the score of "Harmony" at the Ahmanson Theatre and Cicely Tyson for her lead performance in "The Trip to Bountiful," also at the Ahmanson.

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Six special awards recipients also were announced Thursday, including the Polly Warfield Award for an excellent season in a small- to mid-size theater. That went to the Theatre @ Boston Court in Pasadena and comes with an honorarium funded by the Nederlander Organization.

Seven nominees are vying for the best production award: "Firemen" at the Echo Theater; "Floyd Collins" at the La Mirada Theatre for the Performing Arts; "One in the Chamber" at the Lounge Theatre; Deaf West Theatre's "Spring Awakening" at Inner City Arts; "Stupid ... Bird" at the Theatre @ Boston Court; "Taste" at Sacred Fools Theater; and "The Behavior of Broadus" at Sacred Fools.

Three nominations were given out for the McCulloh Award for Revival, which honors plays written between 1920 and 1980. Those are: "A Delicate Balance" at the Odyssey Theatre, "Pippin" at Hollywood Pantages and "Ruth Draper's Monologues" at Geffen Playhouse.

Of the top-nominated productions, all but "One in the Chamber" and "Taste" received positive reviews from The Times. ("One in the Chamber" was not reviewed, and "Taste," about the cannibalistic consumption of a penis, was found by Times' Theater Critic Charles McNulty to lack artistic control and moral vision.)

McNulty called "Firemen" "indecorous (though sensationally acted)," and described it as "a daring new play by Tommy Smith that treats the relationship between a school secretary in her late 30s and a 14-year-old boy as a kind of twisted love story."

Of "Floyd Collins" Margaret Gray wrote, "I had never seen anything quite like it, and it grew on me slowly. But I can't stop thinking about and humming snippets from La Mirada Theatre's revival of 'Floyd Collins,' the odd, haunting musical about the Kentucky cave explorer who got himself trapped underground in 1925."

"Spring Awakening," the acclaimed piece by Deaf West about sexually curious and deeply repressed German youth, garnered the following praise from Foley: "If rippling goosebumps are any indication of emotional involvement, this show delivers."

When McNulty reviewed what he called the profanely titled "Stupid ... Bird," he noted that he would "entreat those of you with a love of Anton Chekhov and a taste for theatrical horseplay to rush out and see Aaron Posner's bright, jocular and not in the least offensive modernization of 'The Seagull.'"

"The Behavior of Broadus," which is about John Broadus Watson, the father of behaviorism, received good words from reviewer David C. Nichols: "Controversial psychology and showbiz moxie commingle in 'The Behavior of Broadus' with triumphant results."